Silly question

[Geoff Bannister]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at yahoogroups.com, "Child Of Midian" <md at ...> wrote:
 
zanooda:
> > Here is a sentence: "The graveyard is full of the names of ancient magical
> families, and this accounts, no doubt, for the stories of hauntings that
> have dogged the little church for many centuries".
> > 
> > My question may seem a little silly, but since there is an argument, I
> have to ask: what exactly "have dogged" that church, stories or hauntings
> :-)? Thank you!

md: 
> The first thing that strikes me is "the graveyard is full of" that should be
> "the graveyard was full of" because "is" is present tense and the book is
> past tense. 

Geoff:
Just in passing, I don't know why an attribution to me occurred in your 
heading (which I deleted not relevant to the post).

Moving on, if you read the quote in context, it makes perfect sense in 
the present tense (no pun intended):
"Most celebrated of these half-magical dwelling places is, perhaps, 
Godric's Hollow, the West Country village where the great wizard Godric 
Gryffindor was born and where Bowman Wright, wizarding smith, forged 
the first Golden Snitch. The graveyard is full of the names of ancient 
magical families and this accounts, no doubt, for the stories of hauntings 
that have dogged the little church for many centuries."
(DH "Godric's Hollow" p.261 UK edition)

Agreed, DH is in the past tense, as are most stories anyway, but in this 
instance the present tense is correct because the village and its fame still 
exist as do the graves with their names.

md: 
> The rest of the sentence works for me. It's not "stories" or "haunting" its
> "stories OF hauntings" which is one thing. Or to rephrase, "it's those
> stories about hauntings that have dogged the church." 
 
Geoff:
I agree entirely. As I said in an earlier reply to Zanooda, for me, there is 
no contest that what dogged the church was the stories.

On a different tack, "hauntings" has got to be a noun in this instance.